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Contextual American Transcendentalism

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ISSN 1799-2591 Theory and Practice in Language Studies, Vol. 2, No. 9, pp. 1792-1801, September 2012 © 2012 ACADEMY PUBLISHER Manufactured in Finland. doi:10.4304/tpls.2.9.1792-1801 Contextual American Transcendentalism Alireza Manzari English Department, Islamic Azad University- Mashhad Branch, Iran Email: [email protected] Abstract—As an outstanding political, philosophical, and literary movement, American Transcendentalism grew during the first half of Nineteenth century. What Transcendentalists believed in was a bond between God and the world, and that God is the origin of everything in nature. Also, God can be found in everything including the soul of every human being which is the place for divinity. The Transcendentalists believed in the oneness of God which is apparent in all religious traditions; they contended if every person has a Divine reason, so he must be free to realize his fullest capacity; in that case the realization of Heaven and Hell would be possible. This article tries to have a closer look at American Transcendental movement in social, philosophical and religious, and literary contexts. Index Terms—Transcendentalism, social context, philosophical-religious context, literary context, American literature I. INTRODUCTION For the Transcendentalists, a direct relationship with God and nature was of great importance. In his essay, ‗Nature‖, Ralph Waldo Emerson (2008) wrote: ―The foregoing generations beheld God and Nature face to face; we—through their eyes. Why should not we also enjoy an original relation to the universe?‖ (P. 38) What Transcendentalists wanted to reclaim was the divine, mystical, and supernatural light bestowed upon human soul by the spirit of God. They regarded the free development of individual emotions as the only solution to human problems. For the Transcendentalists, the world of spirits is the only source for reality. A person sees only appearances, which are transient reflections of the world of the spirit, in the existing physical world. The only way for the people to learn about the physical world is through their senses and understanding. They learn about the world of spirit through another power, called reason by which they meant insight. For them reason or insight was nothing but an independent and intuitive ability to distinguish the absolute truth. In his ―An Essay on Transcendentalism‖, Charles Mayo Ellis (1970) expressed: ―That belief we term Transcendentalism which maintains that man has ideas, that come not through the five senses or the powers of reasoning; but are either the result of direct revelation from God, his immediate inspiration, or his immanent presence in the spiritual world... .‖ (P. 23) As a leading proponent of American Transcendentalism, Ralph Waldo Emerson thought that the spiritual world is primary in comparison to the physical world, which regarded as the secondary. He believed that the physical world through making humans aware of its beauty and providing useful goods serves human beings. What Emerson and his followers believed was that human beings find truth within themselves; for them self reliance and individuality were of prime importance, and so were individuality, a strong connection with nature, beauty and God. Jerry Phillips (2010) in his book ―Romanticism and Transcendentalism‖ mentioned: ―Emerson‘s romantic philosophy is most clearly seen in his work, Nature (1836). In Nature, Emerson describes a world in which nearly everything in it is a symbol of the spirit. For Emerson, nature is the material world, everything that exists outside the self. This world is one-half, a cover over a greater realm, the spirit or Soul‖ (P. 52). Transcendentalists believed that for a person to be able to distinguish what is right from what wrong, he should ignore social customs and principles and rely only on reason (insight). Emerson emphasized on his ―Two Truth‖ theory of knowledge – Understanding and Reason in which the former means the empirical truth and the latter, refers to the absolute truth transcending sense, experience and directly perceived by intuition. In his book, ―Introduction to Metaphysic‖ Henri Bergson (2007) wrote about the differences between these two deeply different approaches to knowing: ―The first implies that we move round the object; the second that we inter into it. The first depends on the point of view at which we are placed and on the symbols by which we express ourselves. The second neither depends on a point of view, nor relies on any symbol. The first kind of knowledge may be said to stop at the relative, the second, in those cases where it is possible, to attain the absolute‖ (P. 44). Transcendentalists regarded the doctrine and organized churches of orthodox Christianity as interfering with personal relationship of man with his God. What they emphasized was a rejection of the authority of Christianity and gaining knowledge of God through insight. Transcendentalists believed that all people were equal in the eyes of God, and all had sufficient spiritual power to intuit God in their daily lives (Phillips, 2010). American Transcendentalism believed in the existence of God within every creature and the importance of intuitive thought. It was based ―a monism holding to the unity of the world and God, and immanence of God in the world‖ (Hart, 1995, P.770). One of Emerson‘s © 2012 ACADEMY PUBLISHER THEORY AND PRACTICE IN LANGUAGE STUDIES 1793 transcendentalist followers drew an amazing picture of his master as a lucid eyeball: his skinny little body is topped with a huge eyeball instead of a head, the optic nerve tied into a ponytail behind. The eyeball with legs wears tails and a hat (Stula, 1999). Ralph Waldo Emerson in his essays, ―Nature‖ (1836), ―Self- Reliance‖ and ―Over soul‖ (both 1841), and Henry David Thoreau in his book, ―Walden‖ (1854) expressed the basic ideas underlying transcendentalism which regarded nature not only as beautiful, but as a reflection of divinity, which is literally the face of God. Leslie Perrin Wilson (2000) noted ―above all the Transcendentalists believed in the importance of a direct relationship with God and with nature‖ (P.4). For them ―macrocosm‖ (the universe) and the ―microcosm‖ (the individual) were in direct connection with each other. They both also took hold of all animate and inanimate objects, and the divine as well. They believed that Nature represented all of humankind as well as God, and also they stated that much could be learned through a careful examination of the minute elements of nature as microcosms of the larger world (Felton, 2006, P. 120). Also the union with the ―Over-soul‖, which was regarded as reflected in everything in the world, was claimed to be the purpose of human life. According to the Transcendentalists, people could develop their capacity by submersing themselves in the beauty of the natural world. They were only the beauty and truth which could be experienced through intuition, though careful observation of nature might help to uncover its laws. They also identified the soul of each individual as similar with that of the world and it contained what the world contained. So, Transcendentalism emerged as a religious movement. In his ―Nature‖, Emerson (2008) stated: ―I become a transparent eye-ball. I am nothing. I see all. The currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or parcel of God.‖ (P. 38) II. SOCIAL CONTEXT Many reform movements occurred during the nineteenth century. These were attempts to change certain ways of things. Of these, three major movements altered the nation, namely: The abolitionist movement, the temperance movement, and the women‘s suffrage movement. One other important social movement in the history of the United States of America was antislavery movement. To the followers of Transcendentalism, slavery was inherently wrong, because it stood in the way of the spiritual development of the slaves. Transcendentalists protested against slavery in a number of different ways and even some of them, most notably Parker, played a leading role in the abolitionist movement. Henry David Thoreau (2004) proclaimed that it was the duty of every person to act against the state where he feels that it is morally wrong. He also noted that ―under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison‖ (P. 78). He did not reject politics in general, but asked the state to act in harmony with the moral principles. He declared: ―I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government‖ (Gross, 2005, P. 8). It was in 1849 that Henry David Thoreau published his famous article proposing his views on government. In that article he outlined the duties of the individuals to government which he called ―Resistance to Civil Government‖ (Gross, 2005, P. 8). The Transcendentalists‘ emphasis on the importance of individual was also revealed in their attitudes towards slavery in which the slaves were deprived of their basic rights including their right of choice regarding their way of living. For the Transcendentalists, including Emerson, it was unacceptable that an individual could be allowed to lawfully buy or sell another individual and dominate his life thoroughly. Henry Thoreau and Waldo Emerson supported the removal of the slavery. Dr. William Ellery Channing (2012), the father of Unitarianism, who acted as a source of inspiration to that movement, in his essay titled ―Slavery‖, favored abolition. He declared: "The deliberate, solemn conviction of good men through the world, that slavery is a grievous wrong to human nature, will make itself felt. To increase this moral power is every man's duty. To embody and express this great truth is in every man's power; and thus every man can do something to break the chain of the slave" (P. 35). The reform of the society through perfection of the individuals from within and not from without through external means, was what Transcendentalists emphasized.
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